Eternights is full of personality, but is there substance to back it up?

thesixthaxis.com:

Despite being an indie release from a fresh, fully-remote studio, Eternights is a game with all the visual flair and anime aesthetic of a veteran JRPG. To no surprise, the game is heavily inspired by the increasingly popular Persona series, putting just as much emphasis on dating party members as it does on atmospheric dungeons and high-octane combat. Since its announcement, I’ve been excited to see how the promise of an action-adventure spin on the dating-sim stylings of Persona would come together, but my time with the opening hours of Eternights leaves me worried that it might not live up to those lofty aspirations.

The stakes are low at the start of Eternights, but they couldn’t be higher for the protagonist and his pal Chani. Chani is helping you set up a profile on a dating app to try and get some dates – something the two of them seem to have been struggling with for a while now. The protagonist isn’t silent, and you’ve got frequent dialogue options you can choose from to give responses during dialogue. There’s a really fun, casual sense of humour to these options, and while you usually only have two to choose from, at least one of them is always loaded with dead-pan sarcasm or disinterest that always added a fun punch to every conversation. The game excels at giving these characters personality, and making them feel likeable and relatable, but it’s the wider story beats where Eternights initially struggles.

Being inspired by the Persona series shouldn’t just mean that you’re an RPG with romancing characters – there’s a tone to the writing and pacing of Persona games where the characters’ circumstances develop slowly and realistically –  Eternights races past that. In the opening act of the game, our protagonist